Heart_of_Darkness_-_Female_Roles

Heart of Darkness In Joseph Conrad’s “Heart of Darkness”, the protagonist Charlie Marlow’s overall view of women embodies the 19th century mentality of females being the inferior sex. This perspective is broadened through the use of several minor female characters, who serve not only to contrast the different roles and placement on the social hierarchy of that time, but to allude to the predominant issue of imperialism and idealism in the novel. Among the women include Marlow’s aunt, Kurtz’s mistress, and Kurtz’s “intended”. These women are said to be “voiceless” due to the fact that in the novel they are depersonalized, generalized, and over-shadowed by the duties and mentalities of men. (…women are dehumanized by being divided into spirit and body and are denied the full humanity that requires possession of both) (Hawthorn 151) Despite their “silence” they do still hold an influence over the men, and it is through the minor female roles that this point becomes evident. Firstly, Marlow’s aunt represents a prime example of his beliefs that women are but naïve illusions in their own world. (It’s queer how out of touch with truth women are. They live in a world of their own, and there has never been anything like it, and never can be. It is too beautiful altogether, and if they were to set it up it would go to pieces before the first sunset.”) (Conrad 85) He perceives them as being inferior to men, while having no true influence on them. His mindset is ironic in the sense that he thinks of women this way, yet it is his own aunt, a woman, who gets him the job aboard the steamboat through her own personal connections. ("Then-would you believe it-I tried the women. I, Charlie Marlow, set the women to work-to get a job! Heavens!") (Conrad 83) He is evidently ashamed of what he’d resorted to, but pleased nevertheless that he was able to obtain the job. It is through his aunt that he recognizes some mere importance of women, and inevitably recognizes the help his aunt gave him. The woman that Kurtz intended to marry, “The Intended” was a woman who represented the values and morals that the Europeans “intended” to bring to the Congo. She was completely infatuated with Kurtz. She saw Kurtz as a highly idealized masculine figure, believing herself to be the most definitive authority on his character. It is painfully obvious that she doesn’t see through his exterior, and is oblivious to the kind of person he really is. In the case of the European-enforced imperialism in Africa, the intention and outcome were on entirely separate pages, much like Kurtz‘s relationship with “The Intended”. Realistically, “The Intended” was very passive and naive. As described in “Women in Heart of Darkness”, “…the way in which European women are portrayed in Heart of Darkness serves to strengthen the novella’s depiction of idealism as weak, unhealthy and corrupted.” (Hawthorne 149) Inevitably, Kurtz is to blame for his “Intended’s” lifelessness, just as he is for the imperialism he has enforced over Africa. “The Intended’s sterile isolation depicts realistically the separation of those in the domestic culture from full knowledge of what is being done in their name in Africa…” (Hawthorne 152) Lastly, the woman who is said to have been Kurtz’s mistress represents what Kurtz would describe as the lacking qualities in “The Intended”, which he simply cannot resist. The African mistress is vibrant, mysterious, beautiful, and as Marlow would describe, a “wild and gorgeous apparition of a woman.” (Conrad 99) Unlike “The Intended”, Kurtz’s ideal white woman of higher society, the mistress was “below” Kurtz and said to be of a wild and savage background, simply because of her nationality. It is ironic that Kurtz yearns for her, seeing as she alludes to everything he looked down upon. In addition, while Marlow had insisted that women lived in “their own worlds” and were voiceless, it was ultimately her, a WOMAN, who had exerted an influence upon Kurtz and the natives. Although her role in the novel was short-lived, she managed to leave Kurtz with some valuable but wordless insight. Her impact greatly contrasted that of “The Intended” upon Kurtz. As described in “Women in Heart of Darkness”, “The life of the African woman is all of a piece: there is no distinction of ideals and aspirations from actuality, no separation between her and her life activity.” (Hawthorne 149) All in all, with the use of these minor yet significant female roles, Conrad was successfully able to put emphasis on some of Marlow’s perspectives and mindsets to fully capture his experiences of that time. Although initially boxed-in, Marlow’s views on women were enabled to drastically expand through simple, yet powerful characters that he had encountered. Additionally, the women themselves were each able to contrast and illuminate different sides of the ideologies and imperialism in Marlow’s story. (…imperialism was able to inherit these stereotypical female roles and to put them to work for itself, a work that in turn further intensified the domestic oppression of the female sex”.) (Hawthorne 154) Ultimately their “silence” did not go unnoticed, and despite what Marlow said about women being naïve and segregated from men, they still managed to induce an impact, in some way or another.